The Bottom-Up Revolution

Rebecca Undem: Helping Small Towns and Their People Thrive

Rebecca Undem lives in the small community of Oakes, North Dakota, and does a lot of work helping her town grow stronger, and helping her fellow rural residents become community leaders. But we know her advice and insights will speak to you no matter if you live in a town of 2,000 or two million.

In this conversation hosted by Rachel Quednau, Undem talks about the choice to stay in or return to your hometown; the connections, family, and traditions you get to experience when you make that sort of life for yourself; and how that doesn’t mean losing out on career opportunities. In particular, Undem has been helping her region think through the ways that the rise of remote work can allow people to commit to their towns for the long haul. She believes remote employment and Main Street can actually grow together and benefit one another, and she’s led some creative initiatives to help people see those opportunities through her organization, Growing Small Towns. Undem also hosts a podcast under the same name.

Additional Show Notes

• Growing Small Towns website and podcast

• Rebecca Undem’s website

• Visit our employment page to learn about our current job openings.

• Join the discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Community group.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Rob Green: A Strong Towns Advocate and Mayor

On this week’s episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast, we’re featuring a Strong Towns member and mayor of Cedar Falls, Iowa. In this interview with Rachel Quednau, Rob Green shares his journey from Coast Guard officer to neighborhood association president to mayor. 

He’s passionate about government transparency and accessibility—so much so that he held office hours in the local grocery store to meet with constituents.

This discussion gets into the nitty gritty of updating some zoning codes and figuring out government staffing in a midsize college town. Mayor Green also shares how he first got plugged into Strong Towns, his advice for people feeling disconnected from local decision-making, and why you should always carry a notebook.

Additional Show Notes

• “Thank You from a Speculator” (land value tax video)

• Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity (the first Strong Towns book)

• Mayor Green’s Facebook page

• Visit our employment page to learn about our current job openings.

• Join the discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Community group.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean, or via RSS.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Sarah Davis: Data-Driven, Community-Centered Planning

This week’s episode is a very special one because it features our summer intern, Sarah Davis, who just wrapped up her internship last week. She was a shared intern between Strong Towns and our friends at the data analytics firm, Urban3. (We heard from Cate Ryba, COO at Urban3, just a few weeks ago on this show.)

Sarah was with us throughout the summer writing important stories that use the Strong Towns approach to development and finance, and make excellent use of Urban3’s extensive research and data visualizations.

In this conversation hosted by Rachel Quednau, Sarah talks about her experience being a young planner fresh out of college, her experience as a lifelong Kansas Citian, and her hopes for the planning profession as she enters her career. Take a listen and make sure to check out her articles when you’re done.

Additional Show Notes

• Read Sarah’s articles

• Strong Towns series on Kansas City

• Follow Sarah on Twitter and LinkedIn

• Join the discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Community group.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Austin Taylor: Using Tactical Urbanism to Make Your Town Stronger

This week’s guest on The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast hails from Utah and he’s here to talk about a cool tactical urbanism program that is helping make streets safer with an incremental, resident-driven approach in Park City.  

Tactical urbanism is an approach to public space that involves making what we at Strong Towns like to call “small bets”: small, temporary projects that require little to no money to execute, which allow people to test out a new design in a public space. It might be a crosswalk created with temporary paint or a bus stop enhanced with lightweight, moveable lawn furniture. The goal is to trial a concept and, if it works well, perhaps implement it more permanently down the line—striping that crosswalk in permanent paint, or installing a full-size bench at the bus stop.

Austin Taylor is helping lead tactical urbanism efforts in Park City, Utah, where he’s employed as a transportation planner. The program in Park City lets residents decide on and propose projects, then provides city funding and city help with the permitting process to execute them. The city even collects data on the impact of those projects.

And, as you’ll hear from Austin, that data shows success in slowing down cars and making people feel safer through street design changes—something we’ve been advocating for at Strong Towns for years.  Austin’s also a dedicated advocate for safer streets, leading the Bike Walk Provo organization, and he’s been featured at Strong Towns in the past. He’s a long time Strong Towns advocate!

Additional Show Notes

• Bike Walk Provo website

• People-First Streets program

• Check out the many resources and key articles we’ve got about tactical urbanism over at the Action Lab.

• Hear Austin on our old podcast, It’s the Little Things, and read an article by Austin about tactical urbanism on Strong Towns.

• Join the discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Community group.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Chuck Marohn: Taking a Strong Towns Approach to Transportation

Making his debut on The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast, hosted by Rachel Quednau, this week’s guest is Chuck Marohn. He’s on the show talking about his new book, Confessions of a Recovering Engineer: Transportation for a Strong Town, which just came out yesterday. 

In this conversation, Chuck talks about what got him motivated to write this book and why productive, resilient transportation is such an essential piece of a strong town. He shares some personal stories about transportation challenges in his hometown of Brainerd, Minnesota, which will probably resonate with almost everyone listening because they’re sadly common.

Chuck also shares his hopes for how this book could educate and inspire people to make the transportation in their communities better. And finally, he offers his advice for getting started learning about the transportation challenges in your city. Step one: Get out and walk. Step two: Observe how your neighbors are walking and traveling through your city, and where they might face dangers or obstacles.

 You can find Confessions of a Recovering Engineer at your local bookstore or anywhere else books are sold. 

Additional Show Notes

• Learn more about our newest book and order it here.

• Join the discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Community group.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Cate Ryba: Connecting Neighbors and Harnessing the Power of Fun

Cate Ryba is Chief Operating Officer and Planner at Urban3, a data analytics firm that Strong Towns has been partnering with for years. In this conversation, Cate talks about the important work of Urban3, which helps cities understand their municipal finances and take charge of their financial future through powerful visualizations.

But the episode also features a conversation on Cate’s previous role as the youngest city councilor in her hometown of Spartanburg, South Carolina, her experience organizing community events and downtown revitalization efforts, and even how she helped create a new dog park in her city.

Cate is dedicated to connecting people within communities who might not otherwise meet each other. She also believes in what she calls “the power of fun” — a belief which led her to start an annual beer and donuts run for charity, which grew to several hundred participants over the course of a few years. That’s just one example of the many cool projects Cate has led throughout her life. She encourages people to find the things they care about, connect with others who share their passions and join in those efforts to build stronger towns.

Additional Show Notes

• Urban3 website

• Get your ticket to the Confessions Book Launch Party.

• Join a discussion about this episode in the Strong Towns Facebook Group.

• Preorder Confessions of a Recovering Engineer by Charles Marohn before September 8 to get access to our special “30 Days of Confessions” video series.

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Tiffany Owens: Paying Attention to Your City

Tiffany Owens is a Strong Towns member, guest contributor and member of the Strong Towns advisory board. She currently lives in Waco, Texas, but before that, she was going to school in New York City where she recently graduated from The Kings College. 

In this conversation on The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast hosted by Rachel Quednau, Tiffany talks about the trade-off between big-city excitement, and possibilities for connection and community that can sometimes come more easily in a smaller place.

Tiffany is deeply committed to understanding urban places and helping others to help shape their communities into stronger towns. She does this through her blog and Instagram account, Cities Decoded. And she’s also recently joined up with her local neighborhood association, so she shares the joys and challenges of neighborhood organizing. At the end of the day, Tiffany really wants to help people open their eyes, put down their phones and truly see their cities, to give real attention to the places and people around them

The interview concludes with a discussion about the power of religious communities and other sources of what Tiffany calls “associative culture”—something that’s becoming increasingly rare in this day and age. What is lost when we give up these places of connection?

Additional Show Notes

• Cities Decoded website and Instagram.

• Read Strong Towns articles by Tiffany.

• Preorder Confessions of a Recovering Engineer by Charles Marohn before September 8 to get access to our special “30 Days of Confessions” video series. (And catch a sneak peak of the series here.)

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean, or via RSS.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Thomas Dougherty: Turning Alleys into Productive Space

Today’s story is about alleys, specifically, how much potential and possibility they hold. While they’re typically just used as a place to park your car or stick your trash cans, alleys are also a space where kids can safely play, where flowers can grow, and, perhaps, where new homes can be built.

That’s how Thomas Dougherty sees it. Dougherty grew up on a farm in Ohio, where he developed an early appreciation for, as he says, “getting his hands dirty,” and being a builder. Later in life he had the chance to visit the Netherlands, where he got a taste of traditional urban neighborhoods and design, and a real feeling of “home,” even though he was far away from his community of origin.

Dougherty recently finished a masters in architecture and the focus of his thesis was how to turn alleyways into productive space, especially for accessory-dwelling units or ADUs. He sees tremendous potential in the “human-scale” of alleys—their narrow lanes, their intimate proximity to peoples’ homes and the innate safety that comes from a cozy, enclosed space. This week on the Strong Towns website, we’ve been running a multipart series by Dougherty outlining the history of alleys and their potential future as places for more life and housing. We’re glad to share this interview featuring Dougherty on The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast (hosted by Rachel Quednau) with you today.

Additional Show Notes

• Read the American Alley series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

• “From Our House to ‘Godshuis,’” by Thomas Dougherty and Dr. Randall Smith, Strong Towns (September 2020).

• Preorder Confessions of a Recovering Engineer by Charles Marohn before September 8 to get access to our special “30 Days of Confessions” video series. (And catch a sneak peak of the series here.)

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean, or via RSS.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Wendy Streit: Using Public Art to Help Small Businesses

Lockport, Illinois—a suburb of Chicago—won our annual Strongest Town Contest this year, and we’re doing a special week of content right now to celebrate their win and explore some challenges the city is facing. 

One genuinely fun and compelling story that we heard about from Lockport involves rubber duckies. Huge, people-sized rubber ducky statues, actually. During the pandemic in 2020, leaders and residents in Lockport were watching local businesses struggle to stay open as activity downtown dwindled. At the same time, a popular annual arts event was cancelled, and there was a desire to fill that gap with something else.

Wendy Streit, chairwoman of Lockport’s Summer Arts Committee, had an idea. What if the city partnered businesses that were doing well (like big box stores and other large businesses) with local shops and restaurants that were struggling? A comfortable business would sponsor an artistic, locally-made rubber ducky statue outside a struggling downtown businesses, and help shine a spotlight on that place and put a smile on Lockport residents’ and visitors’ faces. Streit also brought in a local business “passport” concept she’d seen in a neighboring city: patrons could collect stamps and win small prizes for visiting a certain number of businesses and duck statues.

The project has been a huge success, with businesses seeing increased activity and downtown coming back to life. In this interview on The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast hosted by Rachel Quednau, Streit talks about the many partners she worked with to make this happen and demonstrates what a creative approach can do to help businesses succeed in tough times.

Additional Show Notes

• Lockport Ducks website

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.

Mary Jones: Taking Matters Into Her Own Hands to #SlowTheCars

The story featured in today’s episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution podcast is truly the definition of the Strong Towns movement in action. It starts with a Strong Towns member recognizing a problem in her community and then working tirelessly, persistently over a period of years to solve it.

Mary Moriarty Jones is a native Hawaiian who lives in Honolulu. Her background is in civil engineering and real estate development, but she’s also a mom to five kids, and that’s really where this story starts. Jones was trying to walk her children to school on a perilously dangerous street, and that frustration with the street led her to stand up in city council meetings, lobby the city, and eventually, upon finding out the road was privately owned (a common occurrence in Hawaii), Jones actually bought the road herself.

Then she made the changes she had been begging the city to make: planting street trees, lowering the speed limit, protecting the sidewalk area from cars, and charging for parking—putting the money raised from parking fees toward the upkeep of the road.

Mary Jones is a dedicated Strong Towns advocate if ever there was one. So get ready to learn and be inspired by this interview.

Additional Show Notes

• A couple of articles about Mary Jones’ quest for safer streets, from Civil Beat: “This Diamond Head Mom Found An Unusual Way To Fight City Hall” and “Diamond Head Mom Who Took Over Road Riles Neighbors By Charging For Parking”

• Send us your own voicemail about the small (or big) thing you’re doing to make your town stronger. Just record a voice memo on your phone and email it to rachel@strongtowns.org.

• Support this podcast by becoming a Strong Towns member today.